Jaycee Lee Dugard pictured as an adult for the first time since escape

Jaycee Dugard has been pictured as an adult for the first time since escaping
after 18 years spent in captivity.

1:58PM BST 14 Oct 2009

The 29-year-old is pictured on the cover of the American magazine People, with wavy dark hair and a smile that is unmistakably that of the little blonde girl pictured on wanted posters for two decades following her 1991 kidnapping.

The cover of People magazine featuring Jaycee Dugard

Miss Dugard, who resurfaced two months ago in Northern California, told the magazine that she was happy to be with her family and to have their unconditional love and support.

The young woman is staying with her mother, half-sister, and the two daughters she bore to her alleged captor, Phillip Garrido.

Garrido and his wife, Nancy, have been charged with kidnapping and rape in Dugard's 18-year disappearance. They have pleaded not guilty.

Erika Price Schulte, a spokesman for the family, said Miss Dugard had released the statement to People along with photos of herself as an adult.

“She just radiates. I was thrilled when I saw the photo because it was the perfect representation of what she looks like and it speaks to her joy with being with her family now and looking forward to her new life,” the spokesman said.

“She's a grown-up, she's a mother and a sister and a daughter. And it's amazing to just be in the presence of all of that.

“And if you walked into the room and didn't know the circumstances, it would seem, I think, like any other family.”

It is unclear whether Miss Dugard’s daughters, Starlet and Angel, understood the extent of their mother’s ordeal, Miss Schulte told the magazine.

The magazine published the photos on its website early on Wednesday morning. More photos as well as an interview will be published in the magazine on Friday.

Dugard was 11 when police say she was abducted outside her South Lake Tahoe home in 1991.